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The Great Refugee Wire Transfer
File this under "Good to Know": Western Union can get your cash to a refugee in need as easily as you can pull money out of an ATM. Even if your...
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What it Feels Like to Be an Illegal Alien
For over a month now, Samy has been stuck in the city of Chiang Mai. Broke, alone, at constant risk of deportation, and bored out of his mind,...
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The Bangkok Embassy and International Intrigue (or Lack Thereof)
Embassies make problems go away. In both practical matters (a patient clerk helping a tourist with a lost passport) and popular imagination (a...
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Can a Violent Military Regime Become a Democracy ... This Year?
It’s been 20 years since an election has been held in Burma. In the last election, in 1990, the lifelong pro-democracy activist Aung San Suu...
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Crowdsourcing Refugee Resettlement—What's Your Idea?
Even after getting arrested and suffering a narrow brush with deportation, Samy is still hiding out in the bustling Thai city of Chiang Mai....
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The Armchair Refugee Rescue Operation, Phase 2
I think it’s time to face a few facts. When I began this endeavor a few months ago, I had little concept of what the moving a refugee out of...
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Samy Gets Arrested
Last week, Samy was arrested by the Thai police. A few days before, he had left the refugee camp to make a rare clandestine trip to the city of...
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How to Move Refugees Into Your Neighborhood...
First, you have to live in Canada. Our neighbors to the north live in one of the few places in the world where citizens can take the initiative...
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The Bangkok Massacre Sparks Déjà-vu for Samy
Samy doesn't live near the Thai capital of Bangkok, but his fate rests largely on the government that resides there-and that government has...
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Refugees, You Have a Friend in Canada
It’s time to face some facts: As it stands now, it would take a small miracle to get Samy legally resettled into the United States. I’m not yet...
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Is There Anything as Unfair as the Life of a 24-year-old Refugee?
You’d be hard-pressed to think of something more unfair than the life of a young refugee—especially one with no forthcoming prospects of...
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The Four Most Unlikely Ways a Refugee Becomes a U.S. Citizen
Samy may have just built himself a house inside a refugee camp, but he’s not planning on staying long. No, he’s looking to run through the...
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A House In a Refugee Camp Is Not a Home
With little more than bamboo, wood, and dead leaves at his disposal, Samy just set about building his house in the refugee camp. His friends...
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Refugee Resettlement 102
Last week, I started outlining a very basic version of the process that takes a refugee from living in a camp to living in a "third country."...
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How a Refugee Gets from the Camp to a New Country: Refugee Resettlement 101
How, exactly, does a refugee get from a camp in Thailand to New York City? That’s the question I’ve spent the last couple weeks asking—and...
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One Night in Bangkok, 500 Years in a Refugee Camp
Samy is in Bangkok—over 100 miles away from the one place he’s ever legally allowed to be. After Google Latitudes abruptly alerted me to the...
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In Which Google Latitude Inspires Panic Over a Refugee
Here's a problem I bet nobody had when they were trying to spring their friend from a refugee camp 20 years ago: suddenly discovering that he was...
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The Armchair Refugee Rescue Operation, Phase 1
So you wake up one day, after a full night's sleep, and you're feeling good. You sip some coffee, you read the paper. Maybe a morning dove...
